When Dallas Cowboys running back Joseph Randle decided it made sense to bring up past legal troubles of two teammates when he was booked on theft charges, he likely didn’t realize the audio would go public.
And now that the audio has been made available for public consumption, it appears to have caused some issues within the Cowboys locker room.
It was reported that Randle got into a bit of a spat with wide receiver Dez Bryant prior to practice on Friday. Veteran tight end and team captain Jason Witten had to break up the war of words. This came on the heels of Randle bringing up Bryant’s arrest on domestic violence charges after being accused of hitting his mother back in 2012.
Reserve defensive tackle Josh Brent, who is set to return to the active roster at some point soon, also took offense to Randle bringing up his intoxication manslaughter case, in which former Cowboys teammate Jerry Brown was killed.
ESPN is now reporting that Cowboys head coach Jason Garrett met individually with Brent, Bryant and Randle following the pre-practice spat. Concerned about issues in the locker room, Garrett also discussed the situation with the entire team on Saturday.
The report also goes on to cite a source that indicated Randle will remain with the team “for now” and should suit up Sunday against the Arizona Cardinals.
Dallas is 6-2 on the season and coming off a bad home loss to the Washington Redskins on Monday night. It needs to right the ship soon, and any locker room issues could spill over to its on-field performance.
The issue with releasing Randle is that he is DeMarco Murray’s primary backup at running back. Should the Cowboys release Randle and Murray gets hurt, the team would be in a bad situation offensively.
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